Malcolm Tucker tackles ‘beardy weardy’ UCUNF with one line knockout. UUP ouch!

Malcolm Tucker is moonlighting at the Observer with an election briefing straight out of In The Thick of It.

This week he singles out Sir Reg and the UUP for special mention. 

So what do we do? In my view, as DC gets ready to roll out SamCam in a bid to appear not to be the lardy-cheeked plum sucker the entire nation instinctively knows he is, the big angle we need to hit this week is: TORY NUTTERS!

We’ve got a clear story to tell on this. They’re in bed with the Ulster Unionists. And I think this is a good week to not unfairly characterise these guys as beardy weirdy, bollocks-in-the-mangle old-time-religion, one-step-from-Waco fruitcakes.

Then we have the Young Britons’ Foundation. As we know, the links between these bright young blitzkriegers and Conservative Future are stronger than the bond between Charlie Clarke and his takeaway menu. We need to push this. Any hint of the old “hang Mandela” T-shirt vibe would be great for us, so you want the research team not leaving their desks, fed moulinexed Diet Coke and Subway sandwiches through intravenous tubes till they hit pay dirt. Anything will do. Feed it all in – even Young Tories voicing reservations about the narrative structure of the third act of Invictus. It can all hurt.

Finally there is Ashcroft. Here the line is simple. Ashcroft. Millionaire. Belize. In the public’s mind we want them to be thinking: Bond villain who’s made his money out of sex chatlines and child-labour landmines. Bish bash bosh.

Is it the anthem that makes the green and white army?

The  Newsletter asked me to pen a few lines on the anthem – Northern ireland soccer team debate.

Every weekend kids across Northern Ireland put on their favourite shirt and dream of playing in Croke Park, Wembley or Windsor Park. In their hearts they are Aaron Hughes, David Beckham and Robbie Keane. They don’t know what politics is and do not play football to make a political point.

Windsor Park the home of local soccer is less then a mile from my home. On the night my youngest son Naoise was born, David Healy scored a goal which will live on forever. His boot put England in second place. I remember the roar drifting across the motorway and through the windows of the Royal Maternity Hospital. It was one of those moments when things seemed to change.

The new North is a different place from the old one which divided Irish football nearly a hundred years ago. Football for all is now the by word of the IFA and huge progress which has been made over the past decade to break down barriers to participation.

The next step must surely be to make the Northern Ireland team and squad capable of commanding the support of all in this region. Adopting a shared song would surely be a good step towards breaking down the obvious barriers which playing God Save the Queen puts up.  

I would love to see an all island soccer team but I would be also happy to go watch a Northern Ireland team which is reflective of this shared region and projecting a positive image about our home on the global stage.

Politics should have no place in football.

It’s not God Save the Queen that makes the Green and White Army famous. It’s the changes that have taken place in the past ten years and the passion the genuine fans have for the beautiful game.

Let’s have a mature and respectful debate about making Football for All the mark of our region on the global stage as it is on the youth pitches every weekend.

Holylands needs long term solution as well as CCTV

I am very happy to see the CCTV in operation in the Holyland areaof Belfast. It will provide a necessary deterrent to anyone looking to cause trouble this coming St Patrick’s Day.

It will also help the community at large and the police to combat the rise in crime, some of which has been violent, in this part of the city.
 
We also need a long term plan to tackle the breakdown in relationships in the area and make sure the Holyland has a future as a sustainable welcoming place for all sections of our community to live in. That’s why I am calling for an all party approach to the reconstruction of this community and for a long term commitment from MLAs and councillors to tackle the big issues as well as managing the crisis.

New SDLP face for Fermanagh and South Tyrone

The SDLP has a new face in Fermanagh and South Tyrone and he will be well known to you. Fearghal McKinney is seeking the nomination to contest the next Westminster Election on behalf of the SDLP.

I’ve known Fearghal for a long time and know this is something he has been thinking about for nearly a year.

He wants to play a role in rebuilding the SDLP and be future evidence that we are party with a new generation ready to reconnect with people across our region.

His will be a platform for change in his home county.

A big to do – meantime no progress on education, health parades or a shared future

What a manufactured crisis.

The DUP say the need to the UUP to vote yes but the truth is they don’t.

Sinn Fein say they are the party of equality yet every big decision they have taken in the past year has been built on inequality like denying nationalism a seat at the Executive table.

But that is not the point today.

The point is we need to take a decision in principle to bring these powers to Northern Ireland. It is another small step on the road to real politics here. I’ll be joining my SDLP colleagues to vote yes to that but we will return to the detail in the weeks ahead and argue that the government of policing and justice could be much better.

Not to mention the lack of progress on education, health, a shared future or parades.

The day before the over-hyped vote

If ever you wanted an argument for devolution of more power to the NI Assembly, this morning’s interview with Secretary of State Shaun Woodward was surely it.

He subjected us all to what could only amount to emotional and political blackmail threatening the future of the Assembly if all MLAs did not vote for the devolution of Policing and Justice tomorrow. It was the perfect encore for Naomi Long who in did the Alliance-NIO talking yesterday also threatening the stability of the region if everyone did not get into line and fast.

The DUP and SF do not need the SDLP or UUP’s support to win the vote tomorrow. They have enough votes of their own. My point – if the DUP and SF want to proceed with devolving power they can!

I am not sure the UUP are right in opposing the principle of devolving policing and justice powers which is what tomorrow’s vote is all about.  Personally I can’t wait to get Mr Woodward and his like out of our hair although that will be easier said then done given that the DUP and SF have agreed to let him remain in control of key aspects of security policy.

We were promised at Hillsborough that things would get better on the real issues that matter to people here. So far there is no evidence that . No paper on a Shared Future, no paper on parades, not a line on education, the budget crisis or health.

Even on the inside the DUP-SF axis looks more like a panto then a serious power sharing government.

Explanations needed on increased waiting lists & £11million bonuses to consultants

Today I am calling on the Minister for Health to provide a detailed explanation as to why waiting lists have increased for the second quarter in a row. I have also asked him to follow the lead of his Scottish counterpart and seek a freezing of bonus payments to consultants until the public finances improve.

My call follows revelations that £11 million was paid to consultants in bonuses here last year.

The Minister for Health says waiting lists have increased because of the cut backs in the health budget and the delay in approving extra funding for swine flu. This may be so but nobody can properly test his argument because he is refusing to provide details of how he will protect front line services in the face of the proposed cutbacks.

Nor does it explain why the Minister was then able to return £20million to the Department of Finance this month; money which was not spent on Swine Flu.

The increasing trend in waiting lists is extremely worrying and suggests either there is a policy of stealth cuts targeting front line services or the Minister simply does not have a handle on the financial management of the health service in this region.

News that Northern Ireland’s top consultants received over £11m in bonuses last year is concerning. UTV reported last night that one consultant was paid a £73,000 bonus. This is an outrageous amount of money in the current economic climate. It seems the department is favouring the few at a time when many young surgeons and physicians are desperate to get jobs and serve the many in need of care across our region.

The Minister needs to show the same leadership as his Scottish counterpart and seek a freezing of bonus payments to consultants.

Public meeting – attacks on the elderly

Representatives from the PSNI, Age Concern Help the Aged NI and Belfast City Council have been invited to attend the public meeting which will take place on Thursday 11th March at 7pm in St Brides Parish Hall, Derryvolgie Avenue, Belfast.

I am organising this meeting to give concerned residents the opportunity to speak to local representatives and statutory agencies to voice their concerns about the latest burglaries. I would urge as many people as possible to come along and be apart of the community response to these attacks.

It is important that we pull together as a community and work alongside the statutory agencies to ensure that these attacks on the elderly members of our community are put to an end.

Regional action on ‘legal highs’ needed

It was disappointing to get news yesterday that the Health Minister has missed the second British Irish Council meeting in a row to discuss the misuse of drugs in Britain and Ireland .
 
He is sending out all the wrong signals about tackling the drugs trade and consumption across these islands. Last week’s meeting of the British Irish Council discussed the availability of legal highs as well as the drugs crisis in prisons.
 
Minister McGimpsey should have been present for this important discussion to demonstrate his commitment to tackling this problem. He needs to send a much stronger message about the need to deal the drugs crisis, which is particularly severe here in Northern Ireland .
 
Some paramilitaries are now taking matters into their own hands against legal high outlets.
 
Along with the justice agencies, the Minister needs to take much greater control over this issue and move very quickly to control the import and distribution of legal highs as well as educating young people as to the serious health risks these present.
 
The British Irish Council will not meet to discuss drugs for another year.
 
It is time for the Minister for Health to bring forward proposals immediately to deal with legal highs.

Alliance Party fail to support Bill of Rights in key Assembly vote

The Alliance Party engaged in some political gymnastics yesterday to avoid having to support a motion calling for a strong Bill of Rights.

Having voted in favour of an SDLP amendment which strengthened the motion, Alliance MLAs with the exception of Stephen Farry made a bee-line for the door to avoid havingto vote on the substantive motion. Mr Farry stayed in the chamber and abstained in person.

Why?

Well I can only surmise that they did not think the amendment would pass and when it did they panicked because it might embarrass their new bosses in the DUP if the the Assembly were seen to support a Bill of Rights.

I thought my colleague Dolores Kelly put it well:

We had generally assumed that Alliance were on the side of the angels on human rights in general and the long, hard struggle for a Northern Ireland Bill of Rights in particular. The motion before the Assembly was critical of the British government’s approach which ignores the work done by local people on the Human Rights Commission and Forum, including Alliance members.

We called on the government to extend the current consultation on a bill of rights and Alliance supported our amendment. But when it came to the substantive motion they suddenly disappeared and it was voted down by the unionists.

The issue of rights strongly protected and enforced in law goes right to the heart what has divided our society, and in our view a Bill of Rights has the ability to take basic human and civil rights completely out of the party-political arena. Today they went back into the arena with a bump due to the increasingly odd behaviour of the Alliance party.  We hope this does not represent some new departure or unionist line-up as part of dropping their claim to be an opposition party. That would be a great blow to our hopes of a shared future.